[HN Gopher] Atari 800XL PCB Remake
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Atari 800XL PCB Remake
Author : mariuz
Score : 51 points
Date : 2021-03-14 16:30 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (ezcontents.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (ezcontents.org)
| bullen wrote:
| The C64 SID really was an improvement:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o321fq7O7-Q (Jump to 10:30 for
| Atari)
|
| I wonder why 8-bit Atari failed against Commodore, must have been
| pricing?
|
| The VIC-20 was released after the 400/800 but at half the price
| of the 400!
|
| Then the failed launch of the 1200XL at the same time as the C64
| at 1/4 of that price...
|
| Jack Tramiel was a wizard of numbers! And getting people to work
| very hard!
| cmrdporcupine wrote:
| Not for long. Tramiel developed a very bad reputation for
| screwing over retailers, and his management style led to longer
| term problems once his family took over Atari Corp. And the
| terms "platforms" and "compatibility" meant nothing to
| Commodore in that era. Each machine they built was incompatible
| with the next, and the C64 was the only truly successful one.
|
| The Pokey had/has its own charm. The SID is nice, but that's
| hardly what was selling C64s.
|
| Anyways, you're right, pricing. My cousin had an 800XL and I
| had a VIC-20 and my neighbour a C64. Given a choice, I would
| have taken the 800XL; its specs were so much better in so many
| ways and damn that case design was nice. But that product line
| was always more expensive. If the original 400/800 had been
| cheaper, Atari would have owned the industry and something like
| the C64 never would have succeeded. From many points of view it
| is a superior platform (apart, from as you say, the SID).
|
| According to Wikipedia:
|
| "After losing $563 million in the first nine months of the
| year, Atari that month announced that prices would rise in
| January, stating that it "has no intention of participating in
| these suicidal price wars".[48] The 600XL and 800XL's prices in
| early 1984 were $50 higher than for the Commodore VIC-20 and
| 64,[49] and a rumor stated that the company planned to
| discontinue hardware and only sell software."
|
| Warner Bros axed things and Tramiel picked up the corpse after
| he was pushed out of Commodore.
|
| I own them all now :-)
| kabdib wrote:
| The Tramiels were notoriously tight with money, and would
| often just refuse to pay people when they thought they could
| get away with it.
|
| We had some Vax 11/780s (for engineering and finance), and
| DEC's service technicians were instructed to collect a
| cashier's check at the door or walk away. I got handy with
| diagnostic software and a soldering iron.
|
| In one incident, we had some Motorola VME/10 68K-based
| workstations that kept failing and needing things like
| motherboard replacements (they were not well designed). About
| a year after we pivoted development to the Atari STs (hey,
| dogfood...) Sam Tramiel asked me if we were still using the
| VME/10s.
|
| "Hell no," I said, "They were pieces of junk. They're over
| there in a corner." I pointed to a corner where a couple of
| them were stacked up, gathering dust.
|
| "Okay, we won't pay them, then," said Sam. He was grinning. I
| felt a little sick.
|
| You really did not want Atari to owe you money, especially if
| you were a "little guy".
| bullen wrote:
| I just bought a first version C64 Reloaded:
|
| http://move.rupy.se/file/reloaded_sink.jpg
|
| Also in that picture RR-Net for instant loading of .prg and
| multiplayer. The Nunchuk64; an adapter for the new (S)NES
| Classic/Mini controllers:
|
| It's some kind of revenge to play Super Mario Bros on the C64
| with an original new NES controller from Nintendo!
|
| I got the new transparent case too, waiting for the
| MechBoard64 keyboard and new Keycaps!
|
| The VIC-2 chip also has it's upsides, even if the palette and
| 2-pixel-wide 4-color mode is weird; the community today is
| the most active and it's growing:
|
| http://csdb.dk
|
| Edit:
|
| Atari: "by November 1983 one toy store chain sold the 800XL
| for $149.97"
|
| C64: "In June 1983 the company lowered the price to $300, and
| some stores sold the computer for $199."
|
| So it wasn't price, I guess software then!?
| mariuz wrote:
| Also Atari 800XL bill-of-materials (BOM)
| https://ezcontents.org/atari-800xl-bill-materials-bom
|
| Mirror here :
| https://web.archive.org/web/20201122190319/https://ezcontent...
| Jerry2 wrote:
| Excellent work! Now Atari 800XL joins a bunch of other retro PCB
| recreation projects:
|
| Amiga 2000 PCB remake:
| https://github.com/Floppie209/Amiga2000-remake
|
| Amiga 1200 remake: https://wordpress.hertell.nu/?p=587
|
| Amiga 500+ remake: https://github.com/SukkoPera/Raemixx500
|
| Amiga 3000 AGA *(AA3000+) remake:
| https://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=97670
|
| Commodore 64C remake:
| https://github.com/KicadRetroArchive/Commodore64C
|
| Commodore 128CE (work in progress):
| https://github.com/jolsson68/C128CE
|
| I'm sure I'm missing a bunch so please leave links to other retro
| computer PCB projects.
| bullen wrote:
| C64 https://www.tindie.com/products/bobsbits/sixtyclone-
| commodor...
|
| Got some photos of finished boards here:
|
| http://talk.binarytask.com/task?id=8711454161308077109
| intricatedetail wrote:
| I understand it's not possible to copyright a schematic in terms
| of connections between components, so this is a fair game to
| copy, but the PCB layout is protected as an artwork. I don't know
| how this one is similar to original, but I could imagine you
| would like to move things around. Or is it too old to be bothered
| by that?
| intrepidhero wrote:
| Can't see the site because it's down but it's highly unlikely
| this remake uses all the same components in all the same
| packages as the original. The Atari 800XL would used entirely
| through hole components and its unlikely all the chips are
| still available in DIP. So there will at least be a little
| change to accommodate modern packages. ( I suspect)
| rjsw wrote:
| Probably needs an FPGA to replace the Atari custom graphics
| chips too.
| GekkePrutser wrote:
| Yeah my 800XL's memory chips blew a few years ago and it was
| really hard to get new ones. Though ebay helped me out.
|
| But I think the custom ones will be even harder as they were
| completely custom design. Like POKEY and ANTIC.
| kalleboo wrote:
| I follow the vintage Mac community, and there are people
| there remaking classic Mac PCBs as drop-in replacements with
| the same chips since so many boards get eaten up by leaking
| PRAM batteries or old capacitors corroding the traces on the
| board. Most of the chips on the corroded board are still good
| (or at least the ones that are custom or no longer made) so
| you can desolder them from the dead donor board in the
| machine you bought and pop them in the new one
| GekkePrutser wrote:
| Site seems to be down. Seems an interesting idea though so will
| try later. 800XL was my first computer.
| orzi wrote:
| Mirror here:
| https://web.archive.org/web/20210314163530/https://ezcontent...
| arnonejoe wrote:
| A little off topic but wondering if anyone remembers keying in
| and debugging the "game of the month" featured in Antic magazine
| (Atari 800)? You you have to hand type and debug pages of line
| number basic and the games were largely simple sprite games.
| luckman212 wrote:
| Oh yeah! been there done that. Somehow typing those damn things
| in was usually more fun than the actual game. At least, that's
| how I remember it.
| andybak wrote:
| I hand typed apps on other 80s home computers. Credit to anyone
| who managed it on an Atari 400 which probably had the worst
| keyboard this side of a ZX81.
| mrweasel wrote:
| Is it actually possible to get all the required components brand
| new, or do you need to get them of old broken machines?
|
| There where a similar project for the Amiga 500, but actually
| building a machine required getting chips of old boards, or
| buying them on eBay.
| bluGill wrote:
| There were several custom chips, so I doubt all parts exist.
| cmrdporcupine wrote:
| From my understanding -- POKEY chips are easy to get because
| they were in so many things other than the home computers
| (arcade games, some cartridges, etc.). SALLY is easy to build
| a replacement board for using off the shelf logic and a stock
| 6502, so less of a complicated situation than the 6510 in the
| C64. So that leaves the two graphics chips (ANTIC and GTIA).
| pronoiac wrote:
| There was a separate blog post about acquiring the parts:
| https://ezcontents.org/atari-800xl-bill-materials-bom Mirror:
| https://web.archive.org/web/20201122190319/https://ezcontent...
|
| It looks like they pulled a few components from other systems,
| like a Atari 2600 Junior.
| pronoiac wrote:
| The site's struggling for some; here's the Wayback Machine:
| https://web.archive.org/web/20210314163530/https://ezcontent...
|
| Edit: and the mentioned service manual:
| https://archive.org/details/Atari800XLServiceManual
| reaperducer wrote:
| I've noticed that among retro computer enthusiasts that the 800XL
| is the most loved of Atari's eight bit offerings. Can anyone
| explain?
|
| To me, the original 800 was the best, but I don't know enough
| about Atari's eight bit offerings to understand the major
| differences.
| tyingq wrote:
| 64k vs 48k of memory seems like the biggest advantage for the
| 800XL.
| bsharitt wrote:
| The 800XL sold the most units, so it's probably likely that
| more people had them, and thus more people have more nostalgia
| for them.
| gbourne wrote:
| It is all about the nostalgia. I was introduced to this thing
| called "BASIC" on the 800XL and remember the joy of making
| the computer beep the theme from Close Encounters of the
| Third Kind.
| crims0n wrote:
| This is true for me, my grandfather had one and it was the
| first computer I used with any regularity.
| 23d wrote:
| For me it was an aesthetic thing. The black modern look with
| metallic buttons it had was a departure from the beige that
| dominated computers of the time. Atari had a great design
| sensibility. The Atari 5200 was another great example of slick
| design for the time.
| kabdib wrote:
| ... except for the 5200's non-centering joysticks. Those
| essentially broke the platform.
| cmrdporcupine wrote:
| The 800XL was a major price reduction from the original 800. In
| addition to manufacturing and component cost improvements, FCC
| regulations relaxed a bunch between the original revision and
| when the 800/600XL came out. So they were able to drop a
| boatload of RF shielding, just like the VIC-20 and C64 could.
| The inside of the original 800 looks like a bloody Faraday
| Cage.
|
| And by that point in the 80s the original 1979 Atari 800 case
| design was starting to look really 70s. At least that's how it
| seemed to me as a kid. The 1200XL/800XL case looked so slick.
| It's up there with the Sinclair QL and some of the Japanese MSX
| machines in terms of case design, IMHO.
| bsharitt wrote:
| The 800XL is probably one of my favorite 8-bit computers
| aesthetically, and definitly my favorite amongst ones that I
| own(C64, CoCo2, Ti-99/4a), thought the Ti-99/4a is close
| second with that black and metal design, it's just missing
| some sleekness.
| andybak wrote:
| The QL was a beauty. Not sure if it was much more than skin
| deep but it looked great in a shop display.
| keithnz wrote:
| the 800xl looked cool, 64k of memory and basically competed
| head on with c64 until the rise of the next gen Amiga/Atari ST,
| only to be obliterated by PCs once SVGA came along
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